Savings how much

[Greatballsofedam]

So there are a few threads going around about money and how people can't cope on what they earn
My question

1. what do you earn
   
2. what are your outgoings
   
3. how much is left at from your salary's at the end of the week/month/year
   
4. how much in savings do you have
   
   I am just interested to see some answers

[andpropersteel]

1. £17000 joint (I'm a SAHM)
   
2. £700/month for everything (this will probably go down when we've finished renovating/decorating)
   
3. £200-500/month
   
4. Not much at all now, we had £30k saved for years but used that for a house deposit.

[BretonRose]

Joint income is £150k- works out at about £4.5k a month plus bonuses three times a year
Outgoings are about £3.5k
We have about a grand left at the end of the month
We have about £40k in short term savings, about the same in long-term stuff we can't access for years (unless one of us is ill, it's company thing through DP's work that let's us withdraw without penalty is one of us is so ill we have to stop,working). We're concentrating on making extra pension contributions and house repairs just now because savings return is so poor and we've got enough of a cushion for a rainy day.

It's mostly down to living in an area with low,property prices though. Average house price here is £150k. We lived somewhere for a bit where it was more like £270k and whilst we were still very comfortable we had to make more decisions rather than just go with the flow.

[concernedforher]

I do think threads like these are misleading. We don't know people's ages, where they live etc. I realise I'm incredibly lucky to have been able to buy a house aged 23, and my mortgage was paid off by the time I was 45. I've also benefited from inherited wealth from parents who bought their homes in the 1950s and saw unimaginable increases in the value of those properties. I also live in the North of England, so property and commuting costs are quite low. I've never earned much above average salary, but circumstances have combined to make me comfortably off in my 50s. It will be very different for younger generations.

[fairweathercyclist]

We have no mortgage or debts just bills which we budget for £1300 a month including food. DH's season ticket is a bit under £4K and comes straight out of his salary. DS is at state school but we have some savings set aside for university as I mentioned on a different thread.

We have a mix of pension, shares and cash savings. We have no gold-plated pension schemes though so are trying to build up savings generally.

Not going to divulge more info though as too lazy to name-change.

[fairweathercyclist]

I also think everything is relative. I live in an affluent area and feel like the poor relation at times when everyone is off on ski trips and drives expensive German branded cars.

But - I don't know how much debt they have - and although they have a bigger house than I do, the bank/building society owns it. They usually have more than one child. I've always been quite cautious with money and would rather live in a smaller house with no debt and buy a cheaper car without finance.

[Mishmishmish]

One of the interesting things about the posts of the top earners is that earning over say £120k together doesn't seem to necesarrily make people better off...whereas you think it would. e.g. the poster who together with her DH earns £290k, but their costs are massive and they say no savings. So does earning a humungous salary mean you get sucked into paying for an expensive lifestyle and private schools and so on?

[Coverup890]

Dp earns £15000 and I earn £12000

after bills we have about 100 a week for a family of five.

No savings at all

[TheHiphopopotamus]

If it makes you feel better, one of the posters on this thread claiming a high income was caught out bullshitting on the master bedroom thread

Yeah, I always take threads like this with a pinch of salt. You can just say what ever you want

We have a joint income of £12,000,000 ish per month as I invented Google and my husband is heir to a shoelace fortune (his grandad owns the factory that has exclusive rights to shoelace production). We only manage to save £10 a month though, as I like to spend it all on handbags. I consider them an investment though.

See? (Only 70% of that is false, I didn't want to out myself).

[concernedforher]

Mishmishmish I think you've got a point there. There are costs involved just to work, and these increase the more you earn. Firstly there's clothes - a Next suit just won't cut it for a partner in a law firm or even a fairly junior solicitor. You're short of time so you employ cleaners/gardeners/dog walkers etc. Your children are in private school. Your hours mean that a childminder or nursery isn't an option so you have a nanny.

A friend of mine works fora law firm and they had a cost cutting exercise where to avoid redundancies people volunteered to take unpaid leave. He said the number of highly paid people who just couldn't do it was quite alarming. People who lived pay cheque to pay cheque yet outwardly were very affluent.

[Ecureuil]

a Next suit just won't cut it for a partner in a law firm or even a fairly junior solicitor

Oh I dunno. DH works in banking, he's fairly senior, managing a team of 20. He is completely not interested in clothes and complains at even paying ful Next prices. He gets his suits from the Next outlet shop!

[Namechangeahoy20]

In response to a pp questioning our take home pay student loan, pensions and childcare vouchers come out before we are paid :) Unfortunately we have to top up the vouchers but it is a help.

I think it's important to bear in mind that some people will be making things up. Also ages of people are important. We don't have the savings that a lot of people are reporting but we are in our twenties with a child and buying a house. Hopefully is 20-30 years we will have more :)

[RebelandaStunner]

What surprises me with these threads is that people with enormous incomes have the time to MN

1. Me P/time less than national average DH a few x that plus bonuses. Rental income £20k+
   
2. £2k ish we have properties to look after.
   

3.£0 make sure everything is saved, invested or keeping the economy going.

1. Enough to survive for at least a year and provide DC a house deposit.
   

Plus pensions and the highest worth- equity.

[Pallisers]

I think it's important to bear in mind that some people will be making things up. Also ages of people are important.

I agree with this. If I answered this question in my late 20s I would have said I have a couple of thousand in savings, no house, no deposit for a house, no debt and a good job with prospects. Ditto dh.

In our 30s we would have said the same except we had bought a small house with a 90 percent mortgage and had no savings and were living very frugally. In one year, our total expenditure on childcare exceeded my income (or dh's income - we earned the same).

It was only when we hit our 40s that our earnings went up, our childcare costs went down, and we were able to save etc. Now my answer would be on the very high end of what people are giving as answers.

[joannegrady90]

Earn £15,600 a year. Single parent.

Can't afford to save much, no childcare costs, as dd at school and family helps out.

Go on holiday once a year, not this year though as decorating house.

Jealous of some people's salary on here haha 😂

[Mishmishmish]

Mmmm, I guess you get sucked into a spending circus. I see it with very dear friends of mind who must earn c. £250k (he does, she's at home), three kids at boarding school, a horse, several holidays a year and just very careless about possessions which totally shocks me - a super high end sleeping bag (talking hundreds of pounds) taken on a school away weekend and lost and the parents just don't seem to care. I wonder at what point you kind of give in and just jump on the big spending roundabout. I'd like to think I'd hold off and be all state school and TESCO but I think in reality I'd be buying Persian kittens and gold plating my loo :)

[pitterpatterrain]

Mish would agree it must be easy to get carried away and develop a new normal of spending. There seems to be less thought about "what if" and building up a safe financial buffer.

Also the social pressure of not wanting your kids to be the only ones that aren't at private school / don't ski / do ballet / horse ride etc etc etc

[Ecureuil]

What surprises me with these threads is that people with enormous incomes have the time to MN confused

Why? Employers are still bound by EU law on working hours.
DH earns £80k so not an enormous amount, but works a standard 9-5 (although with a long commute which he often works during). His boss earns 100k+ and works 9-5, as does their boss.

[Werkzallhourz]

The reality is that 50% of Brits earn under £24k a year. 80% earn under £40k and 90% earn under £50k.

If you earn over £100k, you are in the top 1% of all British income earners, of which there are approximately 640,000 in the country.

These are IFS official figures.

[MinesaLattecino]

Ecureuil

That is the absolute exception to any high earners I know. Or even moderate earners to be honest.

They are likely to have enough autonomy in their day to log on to MN for 15 minutes, but they're also likely to be working far far in excess of 9-5.

I am intrigued by the industry your DH works in? The EU Working Hours directive means diddly squat when you have a lot of responsibility and work to be done in a senior role, you just crack on with it.

[taptonaria27]

Our Savings are equivalent to a years salary

[Ecureuil]

He works in banking MinesaLattecino! As did I before becoming a SAHM. Yes he does often work in excess of 9-5, as I started above he works on his (considerable) commute. However his contracted hours are 9-5.
My point was just that high earners don't work 24 hours a day. Of course they have time to write a couple of posts on MN (this one has just taken me less than a minute).

[carefreeeee]

21,000 income (net). Save about £5000 per year. The rest is outgoings. Total savings about 80,000 but I have no pension and don't own a house

[tryinghardnottocry]

Both DH and I save exactly 25% of what we earn net - it comes out of our salaries each month the day after we get paid. We both work for the local authority We learn to live within the balance that remains. We have done that for the last 20 years and use the saving to buy investment properties and the rents get reinvested within that portfolio.

It is a simple model and whilst we have taken out BTL mortgages to acquire houses we are now able to buy them using only short term borrowings.

If you have never had it, then you never miss it and that for us works and i think it would for many others

[iloveuihateu]

I earn approx £100k a year but pay reasonably low tax as self employed.

Outgoings are about £3.5k a month across rent £1.5k and debts £1k plus other bills.

I'm shockingly bad at saving so not saving anything at the moment (though in my defence am paying £10K towards our wedding this year and DP was out of work for the past 8 months).

Savings of £18k towards house deposit.

Now DP is just about to start earning £2.5k a month gross and hoping to save £1k a month towards future mat leave for me.

[iloveuihateu]

For those worried about safety of info....even if MN got hacked all they'd have is the name of my gmail account. I can't imagine how my gmail account name (without password) and my earnings would help them?

Even if they then managed to hack my gmail account it's just for personal matters and wouldn't get them any closer to my bank details?

What is it that you think someone could do?